


Chance Encounters

by Anna (adoring_audience)



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-19
Updated: 2013-03-19
Packaged: 2017-12-05 19:38:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/727158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adoring_audience/pseuds/Anna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              
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<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><p>This is an AU in which Brian and Justin meet under different circumstances and at a later point in their lives.<br/><br/>
The story was strongly inspired by an old Russian song. It is not, however, a songfic. For those of you who are interested, the link to the song and the lyrics (for those who can read them) will be provided at the end of the last chapter.
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	1. Live

 

 

_What I’m gonna live for_  
 _What I’m gonna die for_  
 _Who you gonna fight for_  
 _I can’t answer that_

  
_©Bryn Christopher_

 

 

 

**Part I: Live**

 

 

 

**[Chicago, IL – Pittsburgh, PA | Friday 5 PM]**

“I’m seriously not in a joking mood,” you grouse into the phone, squeezing the small mobile violently, like it had offended you personally.

“I’m seriously not joking,” Cynthia replies calmly. You almost wish she’d snapped at you, so you’d have an excuse to bark some kind of expletive at her. Not that you wouldn’t pay for it later, but the thought to let off some steam is too appealing at this moment to care about the consequences. Unfortunately, Cynthia has worked for and with you for too long to provide an easy target for your temperament.

You squeeze the bridge of your nose with your other hand and close your eyes, pressing out between your teeth as malevolently as you dare, “So, what are my options?”

You hear some paper rustling at the other end of the line, followed by Cynthia’s reply, “Greyhound and Amtrak.”

Just what you suspected. Damn. “Aren’t there private charters available in this goddamned city?”

“Brian,” Cynthia replies with admirable patience, “complete restriction on airspace of the entire Northeastern means it’s restricted to private charters as well.”

She almost launches into another extended explanation, but you have barely listened to it the first time around and weren’t about to waste more time not listening to it again. Before she can say another word, you interrupt, “Alright, alright. Book me on the Amtrak then. ASAP.”

“Good choice, boss,” she answers with a great deal more of a cheer in her voice. You hear her hit the keyboard at a rapid pace before she spills out the information. “Travelling time only nine and a half hours, but it’s leaving in less than sixty minutes.”

You glance at your wrist watch – a few minutes after five. Then the other bit of information filters through to your brain. “ _Only_  nine and a half hours?! You’re kidding, right?” Somewhere in the back of your mind you’re afraid that, in fact, she isn’t, but you still add in a somewhat pleading tone, “Please tell me you’re kidding. I’ll give you a raise if you do.”

“Don’t bother. I work too long hours to spend what you’re paying me now as it is.” You hear the thinly veiled critique, but choose to ignore it. “Besides,” Cynthia continues, “couldn’t if I wanted to. Look at it this way: On the Greyhound it would take you more than twelve hours to get back. Plus, the Amtrak is a direct connection.”

“Can you book me in the first class at least?” you ask, silently begging the universe for small favors. “Do they even have first class on trains?”

“Sorry, you’re not the only one resigned to find alternate travel arrangements. It’s all sold out. They have no first class per se on trains; they have private bedrooms, but as I said, they’re all booked. Even all the reserved coach seats are booked,” she says over the faint noise of typing. “I’m afraid you’re left with lower coach seat.” The universe hates you – just as you’ve always suspected; at least now it’s official.

You groan nevertheless. Of course. This is just not your day. In fact, it isn’t your week either. The trip to Chicago was doomed from the beginning. First the too talkative lady on the plane in the seat next to yours; then your driver being late to pick you up from the airport; followed by a less than satisfactory meeting with Leo Brown, who’d refused to sign right away and instead requested time to consider your pitch. And now this. You have already been on your way to the airport when Cynthia finally managed to reach you on your cell and explained about all flights being cancelled for the next twelve hours due to some security threat or storm warning or birds’ flight paths or whatever the fuck it was. You haven’t been listening.

When you let yourself fall into the seat of the taxi and told the cabbie where to take you, the man had tried to tell you something, using wild gesturing that bordered on violent and a few chunks of English that were so garbled with an accent you couldn’t place anywhere on earth that you’d given up trying to decipher it and instead repeated your destination. After another fruitless attempt, the driver gave up as well and turned into the traffic. Suddenly, all of the strange behavior makes sense to you.

You lean forward and tip the man on the shoulder to inform him of the new destination at which the cabbie nods with a roll of his eyes. You don’t remark on that and prefer to close yours instead, trying to remember what it was that made you choose this profession in the first place. When nothing comes to mind, you try to convince yourself that travelling is fun. Oh yeah. Loads and loads of fun.

 

  
***

  
You board the train and immediately make for the Dining Car. You are not hungry, and even if you would have been, you doubt you’d be able to find something edible here. But a stiff JB would go a long way of improving your mood, you figure. Unfortunately, though somehow predictable, they don’t carry Jim Beam and you are forced to order a cheap substitute. To make up for quality, you order two doubles and immediately down the first one. Staring off into the space, you wait for the drink to work its magic and for your tense muscles to relax while at the same time carefully avoiding making eye contact with anyone in the room lest they’d feel encouraged to strike up a conversation for which you are so not in the mood.

A soft chuckle beside you forces you to turn your head. Your eyes fall on a smirking man, shorter than you, of the blond variety. He is wearing jeans with a casual sports coat over a black t-shirt and an amused smile. The smile is crooked in that hot, wicked kind of way and you note your cock taking notice. Damn. They just won’t let you catch a break. He is young, and looking even younger; in his early twenties, you guess, and immediately groan on the inside. When did you become so old that a twenty-something seems young to you? It is an unsettling thought and one which you usually try to avoid, but the truth is that you’d be pushing forty in a couple of years. Sometimes, usually those two or three times a year between major holidays when the fast track lane that is your life would wind down to a more measured pace, you wonder if you’ve already achieved everything in life that there is to achieve; if this is it. You just can’t help thinking that something should be different; that something is missing. Bizarrely, this particular thought is even more disturbing than the one about your age. Thankfully, you considered yourself a master in avoidance tactics.

“Have you been stood up?” the blond beside you asks and the amusement that is so visible on his face makes it into the tone of his voice, too.

You blink a few times, not understanding until the guy points to the second drink.

“Ah, that. No. That’s for me,” you explain, a bit annoyed that your body apparently decided your cock needed all the blood it could get, thus restricting the flow to your brain and disabling your ability to come up with a witty comeback.

“Bad day?”

Now it is your turn to be amused you think and almost roll your eyes at the cheesy pick-up line. “A bit too obvious to be effective, don’t you think?”

“What is?” the blond asks in all innocence that, weirdly, you think is not at all fake but actually sincere.

“This pick-up line.”

The blond’s mouth corners curl into that entertained, slightly lopsided smile again and he says, “I thought about running with ‘So, you’re going to Pittsburgh too?’ but since this is a direct connection, it seemed a bit unimaginative.”

You nod in agreement.

“Besides,” the blond continues, “it wasn’t meant as a pick-up line at all. But if it had been, I’d have to point out that your former assessment of it being ineffective was for obvious reasons wrong. The obvious reasons, of course, being that it actually did start a conversation which really would be the only thing a pick-up line is expected to accomplish.”

Your eyes almost bulge at the flood of words that your mind is trying to catch up to interpret. To your own displeasure, you ask insipidly, “What was it meant to be then?” Only sheer willpower prevents you from smacking your forehead at the dumb reply. You are tempted to add something to the effect that an exchange of words could not be called a conversation in clear conscience when the input of one party consisted solely of a handful of mostly monosyllabic words. But then you reckon that the time for a fitting comeback has passed and would only seem tacky now, so you keep it to yourself.

“Just a general friendly inquiry.” Again, you are inclined to believe it to be the truth, stupid though as it sounds. “You look like someone killed your puppy… and then kicked it.”

“Are you some sort of altruistic philanthropist, walking around, offering help and good advice to people who look beat?”

The blond chuckles and you notice that his eyes are a clear blue. Huh, you think. “Hardly. In fact, I don’t like people too much. Usually I avoid talking to them.”

You can relate. You want to ask what it was that made you an exception but you don’t want to sound like you are fishing for compliments, so you remain quiet. Also, you feel like you should avoid the topic for reasons of it being potentially dangerous. Looking at the blue-eyed, blond guy is also potentially dangerous, so you try to avoid doing that too. You know your balls will want to have a serious talk with you later just for this decision, but it is one you prefer to the alternative.

The silence stretches and verges on the edge of becoming uncomfortable as the guy breaks it. “So,” he drawls, “are you going to drink this one?” He motions towards the still full glass of amber liquid in front of you. “Or do you prefer to drink alone?”

You do, actually. With a suddenness that catches you off-guard you are hit by the possibility of this guy turning and walking away, followed by the equally unsettling realization that you don’t want that.

“No, I prefer the company,” you say. It is not really a lie, you think. You do prefer  _this guy’s_  company and nobody said you are talking about general terms.

“So buy me a drink,” the prompt request comes, accompanied by that infamous smile that appears on his face again and you notice a playful, almost flirting twinkling in the blue eyes that are trained on you. You hate to think of them as something as contrived as ‘pools’ – especially in your profession. You hate clichés. But what about meeting a guy on a train is  _not_? Any other place, any other time, with any other guy, you’d think this whole situation stupid and a waste of time and were you a spectator of it, you’d tell the guys to go find a room and fuck already. But you don’t do that anymore; at least you try very hard not to. You were still trying to work out the benefits of succeeding.

“No,” you answer his request.

Your blond companion stumbles a bit at the resolute denial, his smile wavering for a second, but he catches himself quickly. “No?” he asks back, again with that amused undertone to his voice. You wonder where he stores all those reserves of cheerfulness and take this thought as an excuse to let your eyes rake his body down and up again once more.

“No,” you confirm. “It tastes so bad, I’d actually feel embarrassed to make you drink it.”

The guy purses his lips and thinks about it for a second. “That’s very considerate of you. I could have a coke then.” He motions towards a waiter who passes you and despite his announcement from only a second before orders the same as you have. You grudgingly award him points for that.

Both of you nurse your drinks in silence for a while, smiling at each other occasionally when your eyes meet. It isn’t an uncomfortable silence, like before, and you idly wonder how you can feel easy and relaxed with someone you don’t know. Back in your tricking days, you’ve been around many people you haven’t ‘known’ but you’ve never let your guard down with them; you’ve never relaxed; or felt comfortable. You’re also slightly surprised that the guy who seems to suffer from a severe case of chattiness, is capable of keeping quiet without feeling the need to fill the void. No sooner do you think it, when the guy starts talking again. And you’re surprised again because you actually don’t mind.

“So,” he says with the smirk firmly and prominently in place, “are you going to Pittsburgh?”

You look at him for a second in disbelief before you crack up and actually laugh. The guy joins in and you feel part of the for shit day melt away.

“Let’s see,” the guy pretends to think, a finger tapping rhythmically against his pursed lips. No matter how hard you try, your gaze is repeatedly drawn to the luscious mouth of the blond. “Ah, yes,” he finally says and adopts a voice that in a movie from half a century ago might have been considered seductive, “Do you come here often?”

You grin and are about to reply something when the guy interrupts you.

“Oh, I’ve got another one: What’s a nice guy like you doing in a place like this?”

You share another laugh and fall silent again. A comfortable sort of silence, where you can hang onto your thoughts and forget your day. Sometimes, when you think your companion is busy watching something across the room, you use the opportunity to study his features. He really is young, but instead of a shallow naiveté that usually accompanies youth, there is something in his eyes and around his mouth… not maturity, no, but an intensity that belies the youthful appearance. You find yourself intrigued; interested in this man despite or maybe  _because_  you think him to be such a study of contrasts. You can’t remember when the last time was when you weren’t merely bored by your company – whoever that company had been. This guy though… he is interesting even when he isn’t saying anything and you feel like a kid with matches in a room full of explosives.

Deciding to follow your reasonable mind – or self-preservation instinct, you’re not sure which – you think it prudent to end the non-conversation. You put down the glass, nodding once to signal you’re leaving. “Well, as nice as it was,” you say with no hint of your usual sarcasm in your voice because it really has been nice, “I have to go find an uncomfortable seat to spend the ride and night in.”

“You don’t have a private?” the guy asks and stands up as well. You feel weirdly out of your element at the natural demonstration of manners.

“Unfortunately, they were all out of those when I decided to see our wonderful country from the viewpoint of the railroad tracks,” you reply sardonically.

The guy bites his lower lip in what appears to be a thoughtful manner, unconsciously directing your gaze back to his mouth. After a moment he straightens, apparently having come to a decision, and offers, “You can share mine.”

You raise both eyebrows in surprise. “Share your private room? You don’t even know me.”

Without a moment’s hesitation, but with a brilliant smile, the guy stretches out his arm to offer a handshake and says, “Hi, my name’s Justin, Justin Taylor.” He closes his introduction with a questioning look.

You shake your head at the antics and take half a step to bring yourself closer before taking the proffered hand. As your fingertips slide across the dry and warm skin of the guy’s – Justin’s – palm, you feel something like electricity flicker through your limb. It feels nice. The whole contact feels nice and accomplishes something the alcohol has not: you relax and let go of some of the tension as you hold Justin’s hand in a gentle clasp. Ironically, his reaction at the contact just confirms what you’ve already known: that it is best to say goodbye and never see Justin Taylor again.

His little puffed-out laugh shakes you from his reverie and you notice Justin still staring expectantly at you. Giving your head a slight shake in hopes of dispelling the haziness and forcing a smile to your face for reasons you are unsure about, you finally reply, “Brian,” and let go of the smaller hand, an action you immediately regret which in turn makes the bells in your head ring even louder.

“So, Brian,” he begins again when you don’t say anything else and you like the way your name rolls off his lips – soft and like a purr and at the same time with a hint of mocking. Nobody else says your name like that. “At the risk of sounding like a cheap come-hither line again, will you come to my place with me? I can assure you though that my motives are not of the hedonistic type.” The flirting smile he sends your way contradicts his statement and you feel another pang of regret about having to decline the generous offer.

You smile ruefully, though whether for your or his appeasement, you do not know, and say, “I’d love to.” It takes you a second to process what you just said and when you do you’re less surprised than you should be. In fact, you’re rather pleased this time, even though normally you’d hate that your mouth got away from you. The ominous cloud of ‘this is just so wrong and you’ll pay for it later’ still hovers above your head as he turns wordlessly and walks away from you, with a poise to his step which signals his confidence that you are going to follow him. You wait a second or two to keep up pretense, maybe even to assert your own ego that tells you Brian Kinney does not follow, but in the end you know it’s all in vain. He never turns to check whether you are behind him and you hurry to catch up before his head disappears in the throng of people trying to make their way into the Dining Car.

You feel like you’ve walked the whole length of the train when he eventually stops at one door at the very back of one car, pushing it open and stepping aside to let you enter. With an apologetic grin, he explains, “It’s quieter this far back, away from the Dining Car and the other passengers.”

You hesitate for just a second before entering, your gaze trained on his. The expression on his face never changes, he just continues to smile politely and invitingly, waiting patiently for you. When you step through the door that he is holding open for you, it feels like you’re walking into something infinitely bigger, through a door that is not this cheap wood veneer, but a massive enormous gate that was chained shut before and you expect it to lead into a gargantuan and dark chamber. Instead you are inside a fairly small but well-lit room and there’s a fresh evening’s breeze wafting in from the half-way lowered window.

You breathe in, thankful to breathe real air instead of the ventilated one in the Dining Car, and take a look around. There are two uncomfortable looking beds stocked over each other on one side, and a padded chair and a small table at the other. You jerk your head towards the beds and ask, “Who are you sharing this room with?”

You turn in time to see him look thoughtfully at the two beds before he answers, “Nobody. Told you I hate people.”

“Pretty extravagant. How did you manage to snag a whole room for yourself on a train that is booked out to the max?”

“Booked in advance. Actually, I have my next four to six travels booked already as well.”

You nod at the information and are painfully aware of his eyes on you. “So you travel this route regularly?” It’s more of a concluding statement than a question, but it keeps the conversation afloat. You’re not sure why it’s so important to you that you two don’t cease speaking.

“Every four weeks, in general,” he confirms.

“Business or pleasure?” you ask and decide to sit in the chair.

“It’s not business, but I wouldn’t call it pleasure either,” he says.

And just like that the cheeriness is gone, replaced by something deeper, maybe darker. You do not give a shit about people and their problems, but something in the way he says it makes you wonder, makes your interest peak. You don’t know how to prod him for more information and are not even sure if it’s appropriate to prod, you being strangers and all. So you just stare at him questioningly and let him decide whether he wants to elaborate.

He sighs deeply once, and sags down onto the lower of the two beds, resting most of his upper body weight on his hands behind him. His legs stretch out and the room is so narrow, his sneakers almost touch your loafers. Again you are intrigued by the contrast. You adjust your stance a little, spreading your legs slightly, so your feet won’t inadvertently collide with his. You realize a moment too late that your action probably sent the wrong signals. A quick glance up to his face makes you relax again – his eyes are still closed.

He keeps them closed when he answers, “I have family in Pittsburgh.” For a minute, he leaves it at that and he doesn’t need to add anything else because you understand perfectly. But there’s still this tiny little voice in your head that wants to know more. It’s new to you, this curiosity. You don’t know how to handle it properly. Fortunately, you don’t have to, because he launches into an explanation without any prompt. You never thought you’d ever think that, but you’re actually kind of glad for his natural chattiness.

“Actually, all of my family is in Pittsburgh. That is, my parents and my little sister.” He looks at you with a blank expression which you take for a mask. You’re sure he practiced it in front of a mirror because it gives nothing away and he’s too young for it to come naturally.

“So how come you ended up in Chicago?” you finally join in the conversation.

His reply is preceded by a grimace that is probably supposed to be a mirthless laugh. “I met a guy, how stereotypical is that? There must be dozens of thousands of stories starting like this one.” He chuckles once before starting anew, “I met this guy while I was still in college, fell in love. He was from Chicago. His mother had a gallery there. A good one too, well-known, exclusive. He offered to show her my stuff. She liked it, got me a place in a group show. After finishing college, he and I moved there. I got a couple more shows. Chicago seemed to like my stuff. And it turned out I liked Chicago.”

You listen carefully. The tone of his voice is kept purposefully light, his recounts factual; short sentences, free of emotion. You think he practiced that too. “So you’re an artist?” He nods in confirmation. “Are you good? What medium do you work in?”

“It pays the rent,” he answers the first of your questions before turning to the next. “I prefer computer graphics, but lately I’ve been painting a lot. I haven’t shown any paintings yet. That’s gonna be my next project.”

“If you like to paint, shouldn’t you be in New York?” you ask.

A small smile steals onto his face again and you’re a bit relieved that it’s still there. The ease with which it reappears makes you believe it could never be gone for long. It makes you cock your head and look at him curiously. “Everybody goes to New York. I’m not everybody,” he states with a challenge in his eyes. You like his kind of aplomb. You’re almost tempted to confirm his self-assessment; but you refrain in the last second. “Besides,” he continues, “Chicago has an amazing but still underrated art scene. And…” He hesitates while searching for the right word. “…I don’t know, there’s something about the city… It grows on you.”

“Ahh,” you answer and say from the wisdom and experience of your thirty-six years, “the boyfriend.”

He smiles. An actual smile this time, neither practiced nor one of these small uncertain ones. “Nope,” he answers in good humor. “We didn’t quite manage it to our first anniversary of living together.”

“What happened?” you ask despite your better judgment.

“Success happened. He was the jealous type.”

“You were a big hit in the gay clubs?” you joke, knowing that’s not what he meant.

He rewards you with a chuckle. “Not that kind of jealousy. He couldn’t handle me being better than him, so he left. Went to New York,” he adds with an amused grin. You grin back.

“Show me,” you demand.

“What?”

“Show me your stuff,” you clarify.

“You like art?” he asks over his shoulder while getting up and pulling a flat artist’s portfolio from the top bed. You like that he’s not playing coy, that he’s not acting falsely modest. Pulling it down, he sits on the bed again with the huge folder on his lap, working open the clasps. He turns it in a semi-circle and tilts it a bit, the better for you to see. You chance a look and are surprised, to say the least.

You weren’t ready for the clashing colors and radical forms. You guess you expected something temperate, quiet; though, really, you don’t know why. As your eyes study the daring contrasts and you leaf through the large-sized vinyl pockets stuffed with photographs of painted works, original drawings, computer manip art, et cetera, you think you should have known. There’s something about him that constantly betrays your expectations and his art is no different. It’s audacious and it’s edgy and when you finish going through the compiled samples you look up at him with new appreciation and a huge deal of respect. You work with people calling themselves artists all the time. They are older and often more experienced than him, yet you’ve never seen such depth in their works. You wonder if his way of looking at the world is something he was born with or if it’s a result of something else – of experience, of resistance, of a man fighting to live on his own terms.

He smiles back smugly. He knows you liked what you saw. You find his lack of diffidence refreshing. For a moment you wish you’d know your way around the art world to be able to compliment him on his work, because even though you normally never do that, his seems like it deserves praise. But then you realize he’s too unusual to compare him to anyone else. And you have a feeling he knows exactly what’s going through your head anyway.

“I was expecting portraits or something Picasso-like,” you say eventually. “This is… better,” you conclude, your voice serious. You’ve always been economical with your compliments. His knowing grin tells you he knows you’re not a person of exuberance in that area.

“Thanks,” he says, accepting the non-compliment. “You’re a collector?”

This makes you laugh. “No,” you chuckle out between two breaths, “what makes you think that?”

He motions with his chin towards the portfolio you’re still holding. “The way you looked at the samples. Plus, you look like you could afford to buy some of the better works out there.” His hand vaguely gestures at your Prada suit. His taking notice is oddly flattering.

Coming back to his question, you answer, “I could probably tell apart a Renoir from a Vermeer. But that’s where my grasp on art ends. I doubt I could tell apart an impressionist from an expressionist. But I do know something about form and color. Comes with the territory.”

“Which is?” he prompts.

“Advertising.”

“You’re an ad-exec?”

“I was. Trying to get a foot in the door with my own company now.”

“How’s that working out for you?”

“To be honest, it’s fucking exhausting. And frustrating as hell. I expected it to be hard; I knew I’d have to put in even longer hours, weekends and so on. But I didn’t expect the organizational part of the business to be so tiring.” You don’t know exactly what it is that makes you open up to him. You haven’t shared the blahs with anyone yet. But it feels good to say it out loud. And it doesn’t feel like you admit defeat, as you feared it would. “I mean, the taxes, and proposals, and applications and what the fuck not else is taking up so much of my time, I can’t really focus on the main business. Did you know you have to fill out a form if you intend to turn the area that you  _own_ , in front of the building that you  _own_  into parking spaces?! Who makes these rules? And why?” You sigh deep now that it’s out. “This shit blocks me or something. I haven’t come up with a decent ad in ages.”

“You wanna show me what you’re working on at the moment?” His face shows curiosity and no trace of pity. In the end, it’s the absence of the latter that makes you reach for the laptop carrying case slung over your shoulder.

You bring up the ad for Eyeconic Optics. The bitch you met with earlier this week didn’t like something about it, though she couldn’t say what exactly. You haven’t figured it out yet either. He studies the ad carefully, scrolling up and down the file, and you study him. His hair is only inches from your nose and you can smell his shampoo. The strands ruffle every time you exhale and for a few seconds you watch fascinated. Up this close, his skin seems almost translucent. It’s a milky-porcelain kind of thing. It makes him look fragile. Like a ray of light could make him disappear. At the same time he exudes this energy, a powerful, strong, very alive current thrumming through him, inhabiting the air that surrounds him.

“Have you tried experimenting with the colors for the company logo?” he jars you from your musings.

You focus on the screen, trying to see the ad instead of his reflection. “What were you thinking?”

“Orange,” he says.

Orange? That’s sort of radical. Polarizing. You’re not sure about it. At all. He watches your face, reads it correctly and tries again, “Orange is the new blue. Or haven’t you heard?”

“I try not to listen to this new age modern shit. Blue is blue, it can  _not_  and will  _never_  be replaced by orange. Or any other color for that matter. I like blue.”

He’s taken aback but amused by your vehement objection. “That’s quite a stance you’ve got on something as mundane as a color.”

It sparks a discussion in which you reveal that you had to get rid of the blue neon lights over the head of your bed – a happenstance you regret to this day; which seamlessly leads over to Monet’s blue period, which in turn prompts a discussion of French joie de vivre. That, of course, encourages you to deliver a monologue on Dior, Gaultier, Hermès & Co. and you to defend your attitude on dress to success.

You don’t notice how exactly, but suddenly it is dark outside and you’ve told him about your son, your childhood, and your glory days as Liberty Avenue’s King of Fuck. You learn that he has a business diploma from Dartmouth and that he's visiting his parents over the weekend to relieve his mother from the stress of taking care of her husband. Justin’s father had been a moderately successful owner of a couple of electronics stores before he was struck down by a stroke. Neither his mother nor his father were greatly thrilled when Justin had come out to them during his last year in Dartmouth but it was the announcement of his future plans that changed things forever. He told them that upon finishing college he wouldn’t take over the parental business and instead wanted to become an artist – a revelation which led to a huge fight during which his father sustained the stroke. This tragedy didn’t change his mind or make him abandon his plans, and you suspect a lot of nasty words and finger-pointing must have followed. The entire story is delivered in a neutral monotone and the only moment where his voice wavers a little is when he tells you that, despite his increasing success, his family is still looking down on his career choice. But they have been gladly accepting his money ever since Craig became a nursing case.

  
After you hear his story, you find it even more enthralling that he’s retained an air of serenity, a tranquil balance with not a hint of a grudge or remorse. When he first tells you about his life and his past, you think he’s learned how to block out his emotions; you think he’s compartmentalizing. You realize, he’s not. His voice gets quieter in places and there are a few sad lines to his mouth and a barely tangible aura of resignation to his posture, but his gaze is clear and he looks openly at you as he relives it all again during his recount. You focus on his eyes the entire time and fuck, but you’ll be damned if it isn’t the exact same shade of blue you’re missing from your life.

You learn that he’s complicated in that interesting, non-frustrating kind of way. In that way that makes you want to keep talking to him. In that dangerous way which you know can make you reveal all your secrets to him, but you don’t care. You learn that he’s confident, even cocky, but in that charming, non-offensive kind of way. In that way that can still make him go googly-eyed with excitement at the simplest suggestion. You learn that he’s a fighter; and that he’s lonely, but not desperate about it. Everything else you learn about him makes you believe that he’s a personification of light of which his outward appearance is only the coating. He’s bright and he smiles like he’s determined to outshine the sun and he’s very much the opposite of you and everything else in your life.

There’s something akin to sadness on his face when you say goodbye – you don’t know for sure; not because he’s hiding it, but because you pretend not to see it. And that’s almost as good as telling yourself it wasn’t there in the first place. Adhering to some bullshit mid eighteenth century social convention, you walk away from him without turning back.

By the time you exit the train and find your partner, you’ve already managed to convince yourself that you’re mistaken. He couldn’t be this smart, or this funny, or even this beautiful. In the confines of a very small room and over nine hours of travelling time, in combination with the early morning hour, the two double whiskeys, and the fact that you’ve been awake for almost twenty-four hours straight, your judgment had a momentary lapse. It’s a simple case of an overtired, foggy brain. That’s all.

Still, the welcome home kiss you share with Michael that day is considerably less enthusiastic than usual.

 

  
***

 


	2. Die

**Part II: Die**

 

 **[Pittsburgh, PA – Chicago, IL | Sunday 11:30 PM]**  
  
It’s almost midnight when you arrive at the station two days later, Michael in tow. He insisted on coming. The departure hall is blissfully empty this time of night, only an occasional half-asleep passenger or employee wandering the otherwise deserted space. It makes things easily visible.  
  
“I still don’t get it, Brian,” Michael says for the umpteenth time. “Why don’t you just fly out there early tomorrow morning?”  
  
Your answer is the same as all the numerous times before, only this time you’re distracted, your attention focused completely on scanning the few people in the hall. “I told you, this way I can use the time working on the last changes.” You know this argument is weak at best, but you don’t have another so this one will have to do.  
  
You still bless the coincidence that put you in the office at the same time Saturday evening as Leo Brown called to leave a message to request another meeting with you. Acting on an impulse and trying hard (and succeeding) not to think about it for too long, you returned the call and suggested Monday morning. It had the added effect that it made Leo Brown feel like the most important client of Kinnetik’s. Whatever gets him through the day, you think.  
  
Not spotting what you’re looking for, you say goodbye to Michael, promise to call as soon as you arrive and embark on the train, in passing saying a thank you to the Amtrak gods that decided one Pittsburgh – Chicago connection a day was the best they could manage. You immediately make for the back of the train and once there, you’re lost. You try the same door as last time, knocking once and waiting a second before pulling it open. When you come face to face with two young women, you mutter an apology and close it again. The next it is. It turns out to be empty. After nearly having woken a senior passenger and bursting in on a couple that was heavily in the process of making out, you strike gold on your fifth try.  
  
“Brian?” Despite the obvious surprise in his voice, you again find yourself thinking that you could really get used to the way he’s saying your name. It’s breathy, due to the shock you assume, but still soft. “What are you doing here?”  
  
“I have a meeting in Chicago tomorrow morning,” you reply.  
  
He hasn’t known you nearly as long as Michael, but he doesn’t believe you. “But you hate trains,” he points out.  
  
“And yet here I am,” you say and leave it at that. He’s a smart guy; he’ll figure out the rest. Even though you haven’t yet. Partly to change the topic, and partly because you’re genuinely interested, you point to the sketch book in his lap and say, “What are you drawing?”  
  
He hesitates for a second before a lopsided smile steals onto his face and he rotates the pad for you to see. It’s a portrait. Of you.  
  
You stare at it for some time, both of you still. “I understand about an artist’s creative freedom and shit, but can you not draw these  _imaginary_  lines at the corner of my mouth and eyes? And make me manlier, for God’s sake. Give me a real jaw, a chiseled one.”  
  
He smirks and salutes half-heartedly while you make yourself comfortable in the chair, spreading out your things. You work quietly for a few minutes, each of you deeply engrossed in your respective tasks. Eventually, the train starts moving, leaving the station. You watch it pass the track and as it does, you see Michael standing there, looking intently in every slowly passing window. As he spots you, he waves and you smile and wave back.  
  
“Who’s that?” Justin asks, as he joins you at the window.  
  
“Michael,” you say.  
  
“Your friend?”  
  
“My partner,” you clarify, your eyes still focused on the outside world and careful not to meet his reflection on the window pane.  
  
He doesn’t say anything, instead glances out the window once more before coming back to his place on the bed. He smiles briefly at you and returns to his sketch. The next couple of hours are spent in peaceful silence as you both delve into work again. You only emerge when Justin’s stomach begins to rumble, demanding an early breakfast. At this point, you’ve covered almost half of the travelling distance. It’s still a deep and dark midnight blue outside, no sign of life visible beyond the confines of the train’s walls, yet neither of you even thinks of taking a nap.  


  
 **[Pittsburgh, PA | Saturday 4:30 AM]**  
  
You’re not exactly sure what it is that drives you, but at the ungodly hour of half past four in the fucking morning on a Saturday of all days, you find yourself in the station building on Liberty Avenue. As if you need to make a concession to the remnants of your ego, you sit farthest away from the hallway from which arriving passengers would enter the waiting hall on their way out.  
  
You lied to Michael and it doesn’t sit well with you, because one, he’s a friend as well as your partner, and two, you proud yourself on always being honest. You couldn’t sleep and that much was certainly not a lie, so you told him you’d be going for a run. He barely acknowledged you as you slid out of bed and into your running clothes and shoes before leaving the warm comfort of your home. You don’t like to run outside; you prefer the treadmill. But you ran to the station, fast-paced, all the while telling yourself that it is because of the crisp morning air and not in any way related to the anticipation slowly building in your gut. How could it be, you reason. You don’t even know if he’s gonna be there. Roughly a month has passed since your first meeting and even though he told you he tried to come back every four weeks or so, it might as well be the next weekend that he’s due for his visit again. Or maybe it was the last, but you try not to think about that.  
  
You’ve spent roughly a month chastising yourself, telling yourself to get a grip, to not act like a lunatic. A month during which you repeatedly caught yourself daydreaming at the oddest of times: during a phone conference with a client, during a meeting with your staff, during dinner with Michael. If you weren’t so adverse to the L-word, you’d say you were acting like a lovesick puppy. As it is, you only admit to acting out of character. That is as much soul searching as you are capable of.  
  
Luckily, a familiar blond head flashes by you, pulling you from the self-analysis. He’s tired, eyes heavy-lidded and puffy, his steps hurried but short due to obvious exhaustion. His eyes firmly on the exit doors, he doesn’t see you, or anyone really, as he makes his way outside to the row of waiting taxis. This is your chance, you think. Your chance to go back to your life as you know it, a life before you met him. You’ve seen him, convinced yourself that he isn’t just a figment of your imagination. It’s time to go back now – to your bed, to Michael, to business as usual. And if the idea of never speaking to him again wasn’t making your insides freeze up with pure, undulated terror, you reckon you’d have been able to do it.  
  
“Fancy meeting you here,” you call towards his retreading back. It’s funny, you think, how your voice is able to make him stop in his tracks, pause for a second and take a few careful steps back before finally turning around to gaze at you in disbelief. His eyes are suddenly more awake than they have been only moments ago.  
  
“What—”  
  
He doesn’t come further than that before you interrupt him with a nonchalant, “This station lies on my running route.”  
  
He puckers his lips in an effort not to smile and you try to hide your own grin as he says, “It does, huh?”  
  
Well, no, it doesn’t. But it will from now on, you believe. You allow both of you another moment of wordless staring at each other before you state, “You forgot something last time.”  
  
“What would that be?” he asks.  
  
“You didn’t ask me for my phone number.”  
  
The smile he sends your way is enough to make the morning worth everything. “I don’t ask random people for their numbers. It’s tacky. And it puts you in the uncomfortable position of them expecting your call.” A minute ago he was half-asleep, now he’s joking and teasing you.  
  
“Well, then I suppose you’ll have to give me yours.”  
  
He contemplates for a second, head tilted to the side, smile never wavering. Eventually he reaches out and you give him your phone so he can punch in his number. While he does, you release a breath. You didn’t realize how uncertain you’ve been up to this point whether he would give it to you at all. When he’s finished, he hands the phone back to you. “Maybe next time I see you, I won’t be as surprised,” he says.  
  
“Maybe,” you agree, understanding the message. Somehow it just makes your smile wider.  
  
He nods slightly, smiles one last time, and turns to leave, adjusting the strap of the bag on his shoulder. You watch him go; now with a lot less petrification and a lot more calmness.  
  
“Hey, Picasso,” you cannot help but call out.  
  
“Yeah?” Almost at the door, he turns around to look at you but doesn’t come back.  
  
“You’re going back on Sunday?”  
  
He nods. “Wouldn’t want to stay here a minute longer than I have to,” he confirms. You’re reminded that this is not a fun visit for him. You think he doesn’t like the city any more than you do. Only he managed to leave while you’re still stuck here.  
  
You let him go, watching as he disappears through the double-winged doors. When he’s gone you glance down at your phone. He saved his number under his initials – JT. You think for a moment and add “Graphic Designs” behind it. Less ominous, you decide, should anyone want to snoop around in your contacts or call history. Funny, you think, how you just naturally assume that there will be a call history.  


  
 **[Pittsburgh, PA – Chicago, IL | Sunday 12 AM]**  
  
You wonder if maybe it is time to stop lying to yourself and just admit that you’ve spent the weekend thinking about little else than coming up with a believable reason why your presence in Chicago was mandatory, and ASAP too, but not so ASAP that you’d be forced to book a last minute flight. And you realize with a sudden start that the decision that you  _would_  be a passenger on the train leaving Pittsburgh that night had never been in question. You wonder when it was made in the first place: The day you met? The night you couldn’t sleep? Or how long it’s been sitting there, in your mind, fully formed and ready for execution. But it’s never been a question of ‘if’, only of ‘how’. You can’t use another emergency meeting with Leo Brown – you’ve used that excuse last time. You hate that you need to make up excuses; that’s never been your style. And you know you’ll have to do something about it soon, one way or another. You try not to fool yourself into thinking that there is an ‘other’ to that ‘one way’. But you postpone making this particular decision for another time. You’re still able to dismiss it with a casual flick of ‘only one more time’. On your good days you can still talk yourself into believing that today’s meeting will be the last, on your bad ones you know it won’t be. Or maybe you got it all confused and it’s the other way around; you wouldn’t be surprised. Lately, what is supposed to be good doesn’t seem like it anymore and what should be bad feels pretty damn amazing.  
  
You’re not inclined to go knocking on private room’s doors, so you arrive earlier this time, sans Michael, and make your way to the last car where you wait, leaning against the wall in what you hope is a relaxed manner. You know as soon as you’ll see him, your mind will wander off and leave all trivialities of your everyday behind for the duration of those precious hours. For now though, Michael’s voice still booms through your head. You don’t know if you imagine the suspicious undertone or not when you replay his “You fly everywhere else. Why do you only ever go by train to Chicago?” again and again. You wish you had a comeback for him, a credible reason. But any you come up with sound dishonest; not because you want to lie to him, but because you really don’t know the answer to his question.  
  
Justin’s slim form appearing in the door to the long hallway thankfully pulls you from a deeper inspection of your soul. He’s not even surprised when he sees you and you don’t know if you should be alarmed or comforted by that fact. He just casually pulls open the door with the right number on it and smiles politely, letting you enter first.  
  
“Mr. Brown requesting your attendance again?” he conversationally asks, foregoing a greeting.  
  
“Yeah. We’re fine-tuning the last changes of the campaign before making it official.” You’re not. He signed weeks ago, in no small part thanks to your newly invigorated creativity. But Justin doesn’t need to know that. He’s got too much leverage already as it is.  
  
“Where’s your husband?” He makes a perfunctory move towards the window to search for him, not really interested in looking out but keeping up the conventional pretense.  
  
“Partner,” you correct him. “And he’s home,” you answer, “he’s got his daughter overnight today.”  
  
“She’s from the same mother as Gus?” Justin asks and for a moment you’re weirded out that he knows so much about you and your life. It’s weird because you told him all that.  
  
“No,” you say and launch into the story of JR and how she came to be. Somehow you end up reminiscing about Gus being a baby and how cool and smart a kid he’s turning out to be and at some point you catch yourself repeating standardized phrases like, “Jesus Fuck, it feels like yesterday that he was this small and now he’s started school already and almost done with first grade.” You shake your head. You really can’t believe how fast time flies. The years since you’ve turned thirty seem to fly by even faster than the others.  
  
He gives you a moment to wallow and to resurface again. When you do, there’s a quietness in the room that you’ve grown accustomed to. One of those silences that is comfortable and cleansing and which you’ve only known with him so far. One where neither of you speaks but where worlds are being said.  
  
“Do you really have a meeting in Chicago?” he eventually asks.  
  
You freeze up for a second. You don’t want to lie to him, but you’re afraid of where this is going. Now or never, you decide, and plunge, “No.”  
  
There is a moment’s silence again which is neither comforting nor cleansing. It makes your heart beat faster and your blood grow thicker, hotter.  
  
He smiles, carefree and surprisingly non-probing. “Great. Let me show you my kind of Chicago.”  
  
You agree wordlessly, with a nod and a smile and feel like you’ve signed on to something infinitely larger. Possibly bigger than you.  


  
 **[Pittsburgh, PA – Chicago, IL | Sunday 11 PM]**  
  
Next time you board the train for Chicago it’s at least planned. It is eight weeks later, to the day, and you’ve managed to turn your regular visits to the city into some form of profit. You flew there a month ago. Justin had to cancel his regular visit to the Pitts due to a business event, but that’s not the reason why you went to Chicago. If you happened to catch the opening of his show, it was by pure luck. That’s the story you told him and it’s the one you’re sticking with; not that there’s anyone demanding an explanation. Unless you count the nagging voice in your head, but you usually silence it very quickly with another aspect of the truth. And the truth is that Kinnetik has begun pulling in more and more clients from the windy city. It has the added effect that you don’t have to lie to Michael anymore. Part of those trips really is about business now. And good business, too. You feel awake and energetic. The ideas just keep coming like you’ve tapped into a never dwindling well. You’ve always been brilliant, but now you’re inspired; your enthusiasm and excitement contagious. It almost feels like a caffeine rush, only without the coffee. Feels like you’re on fire. Maybe you are. You wonder how long you can burn before it turns you to dust.  
  
It was interesting to see him amidst his admirers. To see him work the room, see him in his element had a strange effect on your insides. He was only a vague shadow in your life up until then, existing only in a limited time and place. But seeing him there, watch him draw from past experiences and build upon them while charming prospective buyers and art critics alike, made his presence into something solid. You couldn’t dismiss him just as easily anymore. He’s become real in a way that he hadn’t been before. You saw him in the middle of what was his life and job and passion. It made him into a real person, with aspirations and hopes and needs and maybe eventually even demands. This insight was sobering somehow and at the same time inebriant. It didn’t make him boring. With every bit that you learn about him there’s always a subconscious dread that you’ll be disillusioned by the normalcy of it all. Every discovery is followed by the realization that you’re not. You still marvel at that.  
  
“You’re positively glowing,” Justin remarks on your excess energy as soon as he spots you. You used his phone number and got him to tell you which room to meet him in. You weren’t expecting to be the first to arrive at the train station, but it’s just as well. You stowed your luggage and sat down with an evening paper, waiting for him. You didn’t bother pulling out your laptop. Something told you you weren’t going to get a lot of work done tonight.  
  
He smiles a wide, pleased smile when he pushes himself into the room. His hair is a bit longer than you remember – it’s been a month since you’ve seen him, after all, and even longer since you’ve exchanged more than simple niceties. But it’s still as soft as the last time, you think, as you wind your fingers through the strands and pull his face closer and cut into his greeting. He tastes the same as you remember; eight weeks haven’t changed his unique brand of flavor a bit. This close there’s a faint, barely recognizable fragrance of oil paints that seems to always linger in his hair, just beneath the scented shampoo aroma. Last time, you thought the smell was coming from the huge ass paintings surrounding you both, wafting over from the rack where they were hung up to dry in one corner of his equally huge ass studio. You thought he was living very modest when he showed you his apartment on one of your stops during the ‘my kind of Chicago’ tour. But that was before he took you to his studio – an open area of massive proportions, walls and ceiling completely made of glass, atop one of the skyscrapers. Whether it was his art that made you pounce on him or his sudden insecurity about letting you see his paintings before any other soul ever laid eyes upon them, or if it was the studio itself, barely illuminated by the first tentative rays of a rising sun that filled you with a fierce feeling of freedom, you do not know. You had to have him, consequences be damned. The many fragrances that made up his smell were intoxicating and had obscured your mind, leaving behind only an animalistic greed.  
  
It is the same smell that drives you wild now; the same mixture of compliance and resilience and you wouldn’t believe it possible, but it’s better than the first time as you push everything you have into him. And just as the first time you’re surprised at how much he is able to take from you. Things you never knew were there to give.

  
  
 **[Chicago, IL | Monday 9 AM]**  
  
You don’t know when exactly it’s become a habit. You push yourself not to think about it. Much. Sometimes you manage, but more often than not he steals into your thoughts in an unguarded moment, of which you seem to have many nowadays, occupying your mind and leaving no room for anyone or anything else. But whenever you catch yourself at it, you make yourself stop. This is also something that sometimes you manage, and sometimes not. And never, under any circumstances, do you allow yourself to think about the ‘how long’.  
  
You never think about how long it’s been since the last time you saw him and you never think about how long until it’ll be until you see him again. If it so happens that you know the exact number of days at any given moment, you manage to convince yourself of a by chance happenstance which made his last visit to the city coincide with this or your trip to Chicago coincide with that – ‘this’ and ‘that’ being the anchors for memorable reference points, of course. “Of course,” you’re always compelled to reiterate in an insistent tenor, in an effort to shut up your inner voice’s infidel and taunting sneer.  
  
You’ve lost count of your or his visits many months ago – you’re afraid to know the exact number. And though you remember your first meeting and remember thinking to yourself back then that he could potentially turn your world upside down, things are, surprisingly, still the same. Your client list tilts more towards the Midwestern instead of the Northeastern nowadays. There are two new paintings hanging in Kinnetik’s offices; one in the lobby and one behind your CEO chair. Michael often complains that you’re miles away with your thoughts and that you’re travelling too much and what is so attractive about Chicago anyway? You’ve learned to tune him out long ago. You’ve also taken up jogging; though Michael often teases you about the effectiveness of it since you rarely go for a run more than once a month. And you still think the bunks on Amtrak trains are too fucking narrow as regularly appearing bruises along your arms, legs, and hipbones frequently remind you. Yes, on the surface things are still very much the same.

  
  
 **[Pittsburgh, PA – Chicago, IL | Monday 1 AM]**  
  
You like this – the quietness, the needlessness to talk. You know, in about an hour or so he will lay down his pencil and pack away his sketch book. You will shut down your computer and join him on the still too narrow torture device that poses as a bed. You could heave yourself up on the top bunk and catch a few hours of sleep and then, upon arrival, follow him to his apartment or even his studio – both of which contain beds far more comfortable than this one. But you won’t. You never do. Taking this – whatever ‘this’ is – somewhere outside the confines of the train or even beyond the confines of this room is out of the question. Here, you’re suspended, living in a gray area. There is no right or wrong here. And the night lends a cover to whatever else exists in this place that you’re so unwilling to acknowledge.  
  
Hours later, the silence is broken when he suddenly speaks.  
  
“It’s been almost a year, do you realize that?” You would have, if you allowed yourself to think about it, which you don’t. He says it offhand and you’re convinced he doesn’t mean anything by it. It’s just a statement of facts – like repeating a weather forecast you heard on the radio, no hidden subtext to it because that’s not his style. But your stomach clenches and your fingers that were absently playing with the hair on the nape of his neck, suddenly still. A feeling of dread washes over you. You allow it to sweep you away for a moment before resigning yourself to fate. This is the moment – the one you’ve known for almost a year now was coming. You always expected you’d have a plan ready once it would get to this point. You’re kinda caught off guard when you realize you’re blank.  
  
“Uh-huh,” you say. It’s neither a question nor a confirmation. Just a sound, intended to give you time. But this is not your area of expertise; never has been. And your mind refuses to cooperate.  
  
“How come your husb— partner,” he corrects himself in time, “doesn’t care that you’re fucking me on the side?”  
  
You wonder if he even realizes that he’s breaking the ‘rules’ by asking this innocent question. “He probably would if he knew,” you answer honestly. You can never be anything else but honest with him. His reaction is an expression of perfect surprise, complete with rapid blinking and a furrowed brow. You understand all of a sudden that all this time he thought that Michael and you were living some sort of an open relationship. You get why he might have arrived at this conclusion and it’s not like he’s that far away from the truth. He doesn’t need to know that you never promised Michael monogamy, only promised to try. And Justin certainly doesn’t need to know about the ‘no repeats’ rule. Slowly, the surprise clears from his face and makes room for puzzled confusion.  
  
“You think he doesn’t? Huh.”  
  
You think you know what goes through his head and you feel a surge of protectiveness towards Michael. You don’t want Justin to think that Michael’s some kind of clueless idiot who doesn’t see the signs right in front of him. No matter how accurate the assumption might be, Justin has no right to think that.  
  
“He’s a good guy. He’s willing to think and assume the best of people. That’s not something you should look down upon.”  
  
“I wasn’t thinking about him,” he says. You’re surprised; you often are with him. It’s part of what makes him interesting and unpredictable. Your silence prompts him to elaborate. “I thought someone like you, who values truth and honesty so much, wouldn’t have kept quiet about it.”  
  
There’s a hard, sharp pang to your chest; probably because you’ve been sitting in this position for too long. You sit up to loosen your muscles, but it doesn’t help. The stabbing pain is still there. You don’t like it. You stand up and walk up and down the room. Three steps – turn around – three steps – turn around; it makes you feel like a caged lion, so you stop and sit down in the chair, not paying attention to his or your nakedness. He’s been watching you carefully all this time and leans up on one arm, gazing openly at you. There’s no accusation, no expectations, no pressure in his body language or his facial expression, just an honest, curious stare.  
  
“Michael knows who I am,” you start and worry your forehead. You didn’t mean to explain yourself or your relationship to him. Least of all did you mean to defend it, but here you are nonetheless, doing exactly that. “He knows I’ll never be monogamous. He doesn’t expect me to. He lets me be who I am.”  
  
He considers the arrangement for a few quiet seconds. At least you think that’s what he’s doing, because the next moment, he asks, “You think that’s enough? For him, I mean. Enough for him to be happy? What if one day he decides that it’s not and leaves you?”  
  
“He won’t,” you say with conviction.  
  
“What makes you so sure?” he asks curiously.  
  
“Because he knows that I don’t want him to.”  
  
“You don’t want him to leave?” You’re not sure if it’s shock or revelation that is coloring his voice an interesting hue of disbelief. In the back of your mind you see a glimmer of another possibility – that he’s incredulous not because he’s shocked but because he sees something in you; a truth that you suppress. You decide not to dwell on it for now.  
  
Instead you reply evasively, “He’s my responsibility.”  
  
“How romantic,” Justin mutters under his breath. Sarcasm. That’s new; he doesn’t usually resort to sarcasm to make a point. Oddly, it hits the target even more because of that.  
  
“We were best friends long before we became partners,” you say. “He wanted more; I didn’t. I let him know.”  
  
If he’s surprised, he’s not showing it. “What made you change your mind?”  
  
You frown again. You’ve never told this anyone. But this is something you’ve gotten used to already – that Justin effortlessly seems to always be able to pull information from you, because you want to share it with him. You’ve shared so much with him already; he knows more of your life and your aspirations than your own mother. Alright, so that was a bad comparison, but the basic principle is still true. Nobody knows you better than he does; while nobody in your life even knows he exists. You do realize how fucked up that truly is. And so you launch into a story that is not long, but in return fairly complicated. You know it’ll leave you looking like some sort of chauvinist, but that’s okay, you reason. Justin won’t see it this way.  
  
“This guy came along,” you begin, answering his initial question. “Ben. He liked Michael. And Michael seemed to like him.” You pause. Your thought process is a complicated maze; you wonder how to explain best.  
  
“You were afraid you’d lose your best friend?” Justin wagers a guess. He’s not that far off.  
  
“Yes, but not in the way you think. Ben was positive. I knew, Michael didn’t.”  
  
“How did  _you_  know?”  
  
You simply raise an eyebrow at that and it’s answer enough.  
  
“Of course,” he says and falls silent again, letting you pick up your train of thought.  
  
“He would have accepted it. Michael. He wouldn’t have cared that Ben was positive, because he’s just that guy, you know? He would have fallen for him and he wouldn’t have cared for HIV, or the viral load, or the combination therapy, or its side effects, or the limited time. He wouldn’t have known what he’d be getting himself into. He saw his uncle die from AIDS and he still would have done it, because that’s also the guy he is. But I saw Vic die too and God, but I wasn’t going to let him! I wasn’t going to stand aside and just let it happen. Michael deserved better than to spend his life in constant fear, or in hospitals.”  
  
You pause again and breathe deeply, collecting your thoughts and emotions that you’ve involuntarily spilled all over the place.  
  
“So you gave him something he wanted more than Ben. At least at the time.”  
  
You shrug. “I just made myself available. Hinted that I was ready for a relationship. The rest was his choice.”  
  
There’s a long silence after that. Whatever idea he might have entertained about the two of you, even though he never showed a sign of anything, you know that now you’ve buried them all. You should feel relieved, you tell yourself. He knows where you stand; knows that there would never be more than there already is.  
  
“Don’t you think you’re being unfair?”  
  
You expected this. “I never promised you anything.”  
  
“No, Brian. Not to me – to him.”  
  
“He gets what he wants. Me.” You know how self-centered and arrogant it makes you sound. But you also know that there is a kernel of truth to it. And after all is said and done, it  _is_  as simple as that.  
  
“Does he, really? And what about you? Do you too get what you want?” You don’t want to hear this question. There are too many answers to that, too many of which can shatter your world.  
  
“That’s not the point here. I made my choice and so did Michael.”  
  
“You don’t really believe that, do you?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“That it was his choice. You don’t really believe that, right? Because you manipulated him.”  
  
While your mind is busy declaring his accusation far-fetched and untrue, that inner voice that turned your enemy the day you met him dares you in its usual smugness to acknowledge the possibility of him being right. But you can’t admit to that; can’t admit that maybe your life now is the result of a mistake you’ve made long years ago. Because there is wrong and then there is failure. And while your life is far from being ideal, it is still your  _life_. And what would be left of it – of  _you_  – if you let on that maybe he’s not wrong?  
  
He takes advantage of your silence, or maybe he takes it for consent, you’re not sure. But he continues his thought, “That’s stupid, Brian. That noble gesture of yours? It’s not doing any of you a favor.”  
  
“What the fuck do you know?” you lash out at him, ready to metaphorically rip his head off for pointing your mind in a direction you seriously never wanted to explore. You might have considered reigning in your feelings before, but that ship has sailed. It wasn’t about saving whatever it was the two of you had anymore; it was about getting out of this with your life and sanity still intact. You realize it is a far more delicate undertaking. The thought that it might be because it’s built on a weaker groundwork doesn’t even make it to the top of your conscious mind. “How dare you judging me? You don’t know shit about my life—”  
  
Before you can really start a roll, he stops you with the simplest of questions, unfazed at your outrage. “What does  _he_  want?”  
  
You open your mouth, ready to fire off a comeback when, with a sudden start, you realize you don’t know. You’ve always expected Michael to bend to your rules and he did. You didn’t force him to and just assumed that what you had was what he wanted too. You’ve never considered an alternative. The realization is making you angry. The emotion is welcome because it leads your mind onto a different path, one that you can  _share_  with him.  
  
“You think you have the insight? You’re an acquaintance, a convenient way to pass time. You think you know me because I told you a few things? You have no idea. You know nothing. You’re—” That’s the point where you run out of words. Because (a) that’s a lie and (b) no matter how angry you are, you also know that there’s a limit to what you can throw at him without it coming back to bite you in the ass.  
  
“That’s all I am, huh?” he murmurs it so quietly, you almost don’t hear it and you know you’re not supposed to. “I was wrong. You didn’t manipulate Michael. You’re so afraid of  _life_ , you manipulate everyone around you; even yourself.” It wasn’t meant for your ears. It is just a realization that, in his surprise, he doesn’t even realize he muttered out loud. But there it is in the room anyway, threatening you and pushing you into a corner. He was never supposed to be anything. You thought you’ve both agreed on that, though you’ve never spoken about it. And so what if his assumptions about your relationship with Michael turned out to be wrong. He never flat out asked you if Michael knew. You can’t be held responsible for the conclusions he chose to draw. But in the back of your mind that stupid nagging voice sneers at you and singsongs that a lie of omission is still a lie. You silence it by tearing into him.  
  
“You call  _me_  manipulative? And what do you think  _you’re_  doing? Insinuating yourself into my life like that. Were you hoping we’d get to ride into the sunset together? I don’t care what pathetic dreams you’ve conjured up for—”  
  
“Stop, Brian,” he says. He speaks quietly and is eerily calm. “Stop, before you embarrass yourself.”  
  
You sputter, no words coming from your mouth. In your head, blind fury is warring with perplexity. He gets up and quietly, unhurriedly, picks up and puts on every piece of clothing that you’ve stripped off of him only a few hours ago. All the while he continues to talk in that measured voice of his that in your upheaval you refuse to call sad or resigned. It’s not quite the same voice he used to tell you about his father and his failed attempt at a relationship, and you’re strangely comforted by that fact. Somewhere in your mind it registers that this is not leaving him cold, no matter how distant his voice sounds or how collected his body language seems to be.  
  
“I’m just an instrument for you. I could be anyone.” His voice is almost a whisper; you’re not sure if he’s addressing you or talking to himself again. Eventually he looks up and his voice gains volume. His stare doesn’t waver when he says, “I can be the guy whom you fuck on the side with no strings attached, the guy whom you talk business with, or the guy whom you enjoy talking to because he is not connected to your life; but I am  _not_  a manipulator and I won’t let you cast me into that role,” he informs you calmly. “If that is how you choose to construe things, then maybe it’s best you leave. In fact, I think it’s best you leave either way. Because I won’t be your dirty secret, your escape from reality. Someone you use to flee your pathetic existence to enjoy something real, something that isn’t born from obligation. You’re a liar, Brian. And a poser.” He takes a deep breath, and finishes, “And let me tell you this: I did not scheme or manipulate you into something just because I fell for you somewhere along the way. In fact, I kept quiet about it all this time because I thought you already found what you wanted. I thought you and he had something special and I didn’t want to stand in the way of it; didn’t want to come between you. And I won’t. So please, go on to live in your world; carry on with your life that you cling so hard to and enjoy it for all I care. But leave me out of it.”  
  
You’re shell-shocked but whether at the realization that he’s preparing to leave or at his admission that he feels something for you, you seriously don’t know. You search your brain for something to say and find only fragments of a million scattered thoughts. The most desperate one makes it to the surface. “Why are you making things complicated?” You know it’s not the smartest thing you ever said but you’re a complete mess, alternately giving way to anger one moment and terror the next, the last of which redoubles with every piece of clothing he puts on and reaches its peak when he grabs his coat from the hanger beside the door. Because you figure you’re at a crossroads now and you’re afraid your ticket is made out to a different destination than his.  
  
He laughs mirthlessly; it sounds like he’s laughing at you and you don’t like it. Just as you know you’re not going to like his answer. “Newsflash, Brian. Things have been complicated since the moment you stepped on that train without having any business in Chicago to attend to. The moment you decided to  _cheat_  on your husband.”  
  
Some self-governed piece of your brain lets you mutter, “Partner,” before you can actively intervene to make it shut up.  
  
“Whatever,” he growls and sighs in frustration.  
  
You always knew it would come to that; some days you dreaded this moment, some days you prayed it would come sooner and release you from the strange hold he had on you without even realizing it. And now that the moment’s here, it doesn’t feel remotely similar to release. It feels constricting in a way that makes you snap for air because you can’t get enough of it into your lungs and it makes you lightheaded. “Justin,” you try one more time. You’ve always avoided to speak his name; carefully stepping around it as though it held a magic power that you were afraid of. And now that you do, it comes out raspy, from disuse you’re sure, not from your attempt to keep your emotions at bay.  
  
He stops close to the door and looks at you, his face unreadable but his eyes brimming with blue intensity. You’ve always loved his eyes, loved the color of them. Loved how they promised a life you think you could have had in an alternate universe. As he stands there, looking expectantly at you, you remain quiet and use the moment to get lost in them one last time. Because you know that there’s nothing you can say that would make him stay on your terms. You’ve made your choice a long time ago just as he made his, and you both know it.  
  
“What?” he says, impatiently.  
  
“You could… we could…” You don’t even know what you mean to say, to suggest. And even if you did, you do know better. Because you know him; you’ve seen his life and the way he chooses to live it. He gives all of him. He gives all of him to his family; he gives of all of him to his art; he doesn’t even hold back with critics or strangers, daring them to either take it all or leave it. And he expects the same from the people he chooses to surround himself with. That’s what you really saw the day you set foot into the gallery. It’s taken you till now to understand it, but now you truly do. He chooses to  _live_  his life, to immerse himself in it instead of just standing by, watching it happen. That day, during his exhibition, you knew that what  _you_  could give him would never be enough.  
  
He confirms your thoughts when he speaks. “I don’t like who you expect me to be.” His eyes lose focus briefly, fixing an invisible point in the distance above your shoulder before they zoom back in on you, clear, cold, and blue. “Don’t show up here again, Brian.”  
  
He reaches for his portfolio on the top bunk, pulls out his duffel bag from under the bed and leaves, closing the door behind him and not looking back once. You watch him, even after he’s gone. For a moment of defiance you indulge in calling him a drama queen. A minute later you leap into action as the reality fully hits you. It’s not unlike what you imagine being splashed with a bucket of ice cold water would feel like. You don’t get far – you’re still naked and in your bedazzled state it takes you a while to gather your clothes.  
  
You don’t know where he spends the rest of the journey, because you don’t see him in the Dining Car and he doesn’t show up in the room again. When you exit the train at the station in Chicago, you don’t see him but you feel his eyes on you as you leave the building. The early morning sun nearly blinds you when you step outside. You wish it had done its job properly.

 

 

***


	3. Fight

**Part III: Fight**

  
**[Pittsburgh International Airport | Tuesday 4 PM]**

You moved up a few appointments and finished early in the city. Leaving the cab driver with a generous tip, you exit the taxi and head straight into the airport building. You’re just on time to get through security and to the gate before they announce boarding for First Class passengers. Work kept you busy by day and Chicago’s gay clubs kept you busy at night and you congratulate yourself on your avoidance tactics.

Though you never allow the thought to materialize completely, you’re still somehow reassured by the knowledge that all is not lost yet. There is still a fair chance to turn things around. You’d only have to come clean to Mikey and acknowledge years of lying to yourself. You’d never thought you’d end up being a cliché. If it wasn’t so sad, you’d laugh about it.

You don’t even notice the passing of time and already you’re setting foot on Pennsylvanian soil again, weaving your way around passengers and luggage, unerringly heading for the exit that will take you to the waiting line of taxis. A minute later, Michael greets you with an enthusiastic wave of his hand, sticking half-way out the side window of a double parked yellow cab. He climbs out and starts walking towards you but stops the moment he notices your grim expression. His stance immediately changes, becomes more rigid and the expression around his eyes more guarded. You know that he can sense what you’re about to tell him. You’ll be the first one to admit that Michael’s not the brightest crayon in the box when it comes to reading subtext. But he’s always been able to pick up on that kind of your transgressions.

“I met someone, Mikey,” you say out of nowhere, confirming his suspicions in a neutral voice. It almost doesn’t sound like you. But you’ve met so many new ‘you’s in these past twelve months, so who knows. You certainly wouldn’t. You don’t feel like you know much at all right now. Keeping your sentences short and simple is not a conscious thought right now either.

“You met someone,” he repeats after you, blandly, robotic, confused.

“Yeah,” you confirm as you throw your carry-on into the trunk and walk around the car to the still open door that he climbed out of.

“When?” he asks, obviously thrown, as he climbs into the back of the car behind you.

“A while ago.”

He digests the information and his Adam’s apple bobs visibly up and down as he swallows. He nods slightly. At least you think it’s a nod; maybe he’s simply shaking his head to clear it. You don’t know.

“Where?”

“On the train.” You don’t mean to be so short-spoken, but he hasn’t asked you to elaborate yet. You’re not sure if you would. It’s getting to be too much suddenly and you want to close your eyes, want to melt against the uncomfortable and smelly seat, but the cabbie turns around in his seat to gaze at you quizzically. You need a moment to realize he’s waiting for a destination. You give it to him and lean back in your seat, ready for Michael’s questions which don’t come.

You open your eyes and look at him. He’s staring blindly ahead, eyes glistening suspiciously. His head moves up and down rhythmically, nodding to himself like he’s in a stupor. “On the train, of course,” he mutters and you barely hear it. He comes to suddenly, the vacant look clearing from his eyes in an instant. For a moment, he turns away from you and stares outside at the passing buildings of the airport. If he’s making the connection between your confession and your choice in means of transportation, he doesn’t show it.

“Is he someone important?” Michael asks you.

Here it is – your chance to come clean, to tell the truth, to turn your life around. The sheer possibility of it has been the only thing keeping you from going insane or jumping off a bridge in the last two days; this you realize with stunning clarity. Michael stares at you unmoving, waiting for your answer.

“No,” you reply. It’s only a nuance, but you’ve known him for so long, almost all your life, and you see it when his shoulders sag slightly in relief, his facial features relax by a tiny increment and his breathing comes more regularly again. He’s your childhood friend; the only one who knows you and still wants you. He saved you from your abusive father by offering a safe place to sleep. He saved you from yourself more times than you can count. Everything you could ever give him would not be enough of a repayment. You wound your arm around his shoulders and pull him closer. “No, Mikey,” you repeat.

Saying it again doesn’t make it more true. But you’re not the one who has to believe it.

“No, he wasn’t,” you repeat again.

 

  
**[Chicago International Airport | Wednesday 4 PM]**

Business still forces you to Chicago every couple of weeks. True to the word that you’ve never given him, you stay away from trains and fly now. The travel time is considerably shorter, the departing times significantly less god-awful, there actually exists something like a first class on a plane, the staff is helpful and friendly, and the whisky is real Jim Beam. Yet when you arrive in the city, you’re always irritable and ill-tempered and substantially more  _alone_. You manage to spin it into a positive thing – having no one beside you means having no one to bitch at and subsequently having to apologize. It’s all for the better, you suppose.

Only, when you arrive back in Pittsburgh you’re always filled with a deeply rooted sense of dissatisfaction, no matter how successful your trip has been business-wise.

 

**[Pittsburgh, Liberty Ave. | Saturday 12:30 AM]**

You’ve noticed you’re going through a bottle of JB faster than you used to. In a drunken half-daze you find yourself tracing the big letters on the bottle in front of you that you told the barkeep to leave on the table. There are many wonderful things that start with these letters, you think. Jim Beam is one. Blowjobs are another. You don’t think further than that, choosing instead to take another swig from the bottle and focusing on the burn till Michael comes back, dangling the keys of your car in front of your face and dragging you away from the bottle with those beautiful letters on it. You don’t resist – much – following mostly willingly.

While Michael bodily pushes you into your car and is busy stuffing the rest of your limbs into the suddenly way too small vehicle, you wonder how many drinks you can name starting with M. You come up with Martinis and in a long, and for the most part internal, debate declare it’s the only one. You proceed to dismiss it in the next step because James Bond, despite his initials, is a pretentious British pansy since anyone who cares if a drink is shaken or stirred obviously doesn’t appreciate the many other,  _finer_ , qualities of alcoholic beverages. Before you can award yourself a medal for this mental performance, Margaritas suddenly appear in front of your inner eye.

“I ne’er liked Jimmy Buffett,” you mutter unintelligibly and snicker as you wonder if the universe is trying to tell you something by continuing to flash those two damn letters at you from everywhere before you pass out.

 

  
**[Chicago, IL | Thursday 6 PM]**

Lately, every visit to the city takes you to this spot in the DuSable Harbor. You don’t know how you found it in the first place, whether it was through a business contact or a place he showed you, but that’s where you usually find yourself after all the meetings for the day are done. Business continues to demand your presence in Chicago on a regular basis and you go willingly. Every time you inform your partner of an upcoming business trip to the city, you see him tense up and only relax when you give him your  _flight_  information. You know Michael trusts you not to hook up with him while you’re here, and you wonder how he can have this confidence in you when you don’t.

The first time after that incident on the train that you came to Chicago alone, you only stayed for as long as absolutely necessary, rushing through your meetings and catching an early flight back the minute you were done. Each time since then you’ve stayed longer. If it’s out of sentimentality, you don’t know; or maybe you do and simply won’t admit.

You still think about him; sometimes it feels like you can’t think much of anything else but him. It’s ridiculous, really. You haven’t known him for all that long, and the times that you’ve spent together were almost always limited to that tiny private room on the train. It’s irrational that every mock-up or rough sketch for an ad and every early morning jog remind him of you. And yet they do, and force you to this spot again where the boisterous wind helps clear your mind. Maybe that’s why every visit to the city ends in this place. You’ve grown to need the wind. It lashes out at you, the stabbing cold air already carrying the promise of winter; the wind rips at your clothes violently in a never decreasing attempt to sweep you away, stings your face with tiny droplets of icy-cold water that it gathers from the river, blasts your ears with an indescribable roar, filling them with anything other than his voice or the sound of his laughter. You still offer resistance, letting the wind batter you but not budge you an inch. But you’ll allow it to clear-blow your head, to take away all the insignificant shit. It’s highly effective and because of that strangely addictive. When other Kinnetik affairs keep you away from the city for too long, you start feeling suffocated and no amount of fresh air will help. Your lungs feel like they’re threatening to collapse any minute and you find yourself breathing deeper and deeper, never quite getting enough air inside.

You can breathe easy here. You can think clearly here.

As the rough gust bites at your skin and bit by bit strips away layers of excuses and protective shields, leaving only the core of you behind, leaving you feeling naked, newborn, and  _free_ , you think you have an answer. Since you’re not aware of having asked a question, you’re inclined to believe the wind gave it to you as a compensation for everything else that it’s taken.

 

  
**[Pittsburgh, PA – Chicago, IL | Sunday 11:55 PM]**

You grip your son’s hand tightly as you walk one narrow hallway after another. You’ve bribed a train attendant to check the booked privates, so you know exactly which door number you’re headed for. Gus is bouncing half-beside half-behind you, having no problem to keep up with your long legs and quick pace in his excitement for both, being allowed to stay up this late and getting to travel on a train. You know his energy will dwindle down once he’s sat still for a minute. You know he’ll fall asleep soon after. You have booked your own private room, at the other end of the train, opposite to the direction you’re headed towards now. You considered taking the risk and not booking a sleeping compartment, but the moment you knew Gus would be traveling with you, you had to plan for contingencies. Despite the hundreds of dollars you’ve spent, you still hope you won’t need to use the room.

Gus doesn’t know but he’s your secret weapon. With his seven years he is impossibly cute and with his big brown puppy dog eyes he usually manages to finagle a free ice-cream cone from vendors or a few additional lemon bars from Debbie. You hope they can melt the hearts of certain blonds too.

You think maybe you should have come better prepared but there’s really no anticipating his reaction. You’re yet to figure out the way his mind works. It’s not like your head hasn’t been running through variations of possible scenarios all through the last two weeks. When it comes to him, however, all bets are off. You’ve never once been right with your predictions about him. You’re still not entirely sure if it’s a good or a bad thing. But he keeps you guessing, keeps you on your toes. That’s why you are almost certain that he’s going to surprise you anyway; and there is simply no way of preparing for that. You would like to assume that there are two ways how the whole thing can go down: he’s either going to tell you to go fuck yourself, though you hope he’ll manage to find a more appropriate, G-rated, phrasing with regards to Gus’s innocent ears. Or he’ll forgive you and graciously decides to take you back, or rather  _accept_  you since he’s never ‘had’ you before. You hope he still wants you, superiority complex and manipulative tendencies and all.

When you reach his door you resolutely ignore the nervous flutter in your stomach. Instead, you get down on one knee and place your hands on Gus’s small shoulders, turning him around to face you. Gus gives you an encouraging smile, probably sensing that you need one, and you return it, unable to help it when it comes out a bit tightlipped. You mechanically smooth down his hair even though it’s not sticking up and doesn’t need smoothing and check him over. Still cute. Perfect.

Rising to your feet and gripping your son’s hand tighter you feel ridiculous and childish for bringing reinforcements, but at the same time you’re deeply grateful for his tiny hand in yours. You take a deep breath and knock. After a moment’s pause a hesitant, “Yeah?” colored in equal parts with annoyance and confusion reaches your ears and you push the door open. His mouth opens and closes a few times at the sight of you – a perfect imitation of bewilderment. After a few seconds, he’s apparently decided to remain silent. You hope his speechlessness is due to surprise, not anger, but at that point it’s too early to rule out either one. You are somewhat inclined to believe that it’s the first when his eyes fix you expectantly. Time for explanations. Right. Didn’t you have a speech prepared? You seriously can’t remember. That’s another effect that he has on you: his ability to wipe your mind blank is uncanny.

To fill the silence, you push your son forward a bit and say, “This is Gus.” Justin’s eyes immediately zoom in on him whom in his surprise he probably hadn’t noticed. “My son,” you add unnecessarily, and simply because the speechless staring continues to go on. He rolls his eyes at your specification. It’s not like he couldn’t remember; not like you didn’t know he would. Short of pulling out the pictures from your wallet, you’ve told him everything about your son.

“Hi,” Gus says in Justin’s direction and waves shyly.

“Hi, Gus,” Justin answers and smiles at him. “What are you doing here?” he asks your son who promptly looks up at you. Yes! You’re back on track; you rehearsed that.

“His dad is looking at apartments in Chicago and needs his son’s approval before he closes the deal on one,” you explain, hiding a grin as best as you can. Though you needn’t have bothered. Even though you were talking to him, his eyes remained trained on Gus the entire time. He doesn’t even look up when you’re finished.

“My dad’s moving,” Gus explains into the stillness, enviably oblivious to the tension in the room. “I get to ride a plane every time I go to visit him. Isn’t that cool?”

Justin smiles softly at him. “You like airplanes?” he asks.

Gus nods enthusiastically. “Uh-huh,” he confirms. In his excitement, he completely forgets to be shy as he usually is with strangers. “I even get to go all by myself. My mom said so. She’s gonna put me on the plane, and my dad is gonna come and pick me up. They had a long ‘grown-ups only’ talk about it and my dad says they already made all the a rangem—” Gus breaks and looks up at you, seeking help.

“Arrangements,” you help.

“Yeah, that,” Gus says and falls silent, slightly embarrassed again and half trying to hide behind your leg.

Justin grins in amusement, his eyes sparkling, and he still doesn’t look at you. Not even a glance. You’re a bit peeved. You know Gus is cute, but it’s not like you are that hard on the eyes either.

“Are you Justin?” Gus suddenly asks.

“Yes.” Justin’s reply sounds more like a question. But Gus either doesn’t care or doesn’t notice because the next moment he releases your hand and goes to sit beside Justin on the bed, all shyness forgotten.

“Dad told me all about you,” Gus explains, all excitement again. Now that Justin is not a stranger anymore, he’ll be sharing all of his secrets with him before long. You sometimes envy your son for this simple good and bad viewpoint he still has on life. Whoever wasn’t a stranger was a friend. You wish it were that easy.

“He did?” Justin replies in utter disbelief. At least he deigns you worthy a glance at that bit of information. You didn’t think a third alternative was possible when you said he was either gonna take you back or tell you to get lost. But you find he’s able to surprise you there as well as he’s completely ignoring you while excitedly chatting with your son.

“Is it true that you have a house completely out of glass?” Gus demands to know.

“It‘s just the top of the house and it’s not really mine, but yeah, it is made completely out of glass, walls and ceiling.”

“Wow,” Gus dreamily replies. “Will you show me? Dad said you’re gonna show me and he said you make the best smoothies.”

Gus’s ability to change thinking lanes is remarkable and all of Justin’s attention is focused on keeping track. You make your way over to the padded chair, unnoticed by either of them. You almost feel excluded from their chatter, but then you chide yourself for the ridiculous thought. You resign to listen, seeing as Justin makes no attempt at including you in the conversation. You figure, the most you can hope for right now is an occasional glance in your direction. That’s okay, you think. You’ve got the whole night ahead of you and Gus is going to talk himself into exhaustion eventually.

“I’ve never met a boy your age who liked smoothies,” Justin says.

“Dad always has them for breakfast, but they taste yucky and they smell funny.” He means avocado puree mixed with guava juice. “But in the hotel where Dad was living they had a whole menu just with smoothies. You could tell them not to put the yucky stuff in there, you know. And Mom says that they will make me grow tall and big like my dad. And I am not allowed to drink Coca Cola or Pepsi Cola or Dr. Pepper because if I do, I will lose my bet with Dad. We bet that I’m gonna be taller than him one day.” He reaches for you for a high five and you extend your arm so he can slap your palm.

“Your dad lived in a hotel?” Justin looks at you when he asks Gus that, picking out the single information from Gus’s monologue; he really looks at you. Not just a sideway glance, but a measuring contemplating long look. He’s confused, trying to put all the puzzle pieces together. You still remember how that felt like and hope he’s quicker on the uptake than you were.

“Uh-huh.” Gus nods again, his head bobbing up and down rapidly. “Right after he moved out of Uncle Mikey’s place.”

“Michael,” you correct your son.

“But Daaaaaad,” Gus whines.

“Gus,” you say warningly.

“Okay, Uncle  _Michael_ ,” Gus acquiesces, keeping the defiant tone. “But it sounds stupid when I say it. Like I’m trying to rhyme or something.”

You smirk. You haven’t thought about that before. “Alright,” you consent. “But don’t let him hear you say it.”

Your son beams at that. “Deal.” You shake hands solemnly while Justin watches you curiously.

It continues pretty much in the same fashion for another half hour till you see Gus fading a bit. Justin offers him the top bunk which Gus agrees to excitedly. He’s always wanted a loft bed. He’s out cold seconds after his head hits the pillow and the sudden silence is oppressing. You busy yourself adjusting the covers around your son, and dawdle just so you wouldn’t be forced to start small talk.

“You have an amazing kid, Brian,” he eventually says. You smooth one last hand across your sleeping son’s head and return to your chair, facing Justin.

“Yeah, I know. Sometimes I look at him and I can’t believe he’s supposed to be mine,” you admit and chuckle. Normally, you wouldn’t share something so personal with anyone. But this is Justin and you really do want a new start. You’ve kept so many things to yourself for so long; you don’t want to keep things from  _him_.

It takes a moment or two, but finally a smile blooms on his face. He doesn’t say anything and neither do you, but the smile alone is enough to let you breathe a little easier.

“And yet you have no qualms about using him like that,” he says, shaking his head disapprovingly, but his eyes twinkle with amusement. He’s partly right – you did bring Gus to butter him up. But the other reason for Gus’s being here is far less obvious, and because of that maybe more true: Gus is a huge part of your life and when you said you wanted Justin to see everything of you, you meant your son as well. Justin is smart; he’ll figure it out. “Shameless,” Justin adds after another minute of silence, pulling you from your thoughts. “Letting your kid fight your battles for you. Really, Brian, that’s just… I have no words for what exactly it is, but it is exactly that.” He makes your head hurt in that way when you’ve thought about something for too long. You forgot about that. He also makes you laugh. That you remember well.

He joins in on your laugh and it feels good; feels like you’ve cleared the air or something. The tension is gone, though you’re not sure how exactly he’s managed to do that. “You’re such a calculating manipulator. You know, you’re not supposed to do that anymore,” he says in playful frustration.

You almost forget what you were going to reply when he closes the space between you and straddles your lap, knees wedged between the chair’s arm rests and your thighs. He doesn’t move in to close the distance further, though, and you’re free to answer, “You weren’t supposed to come and turn my life upside down and inside out.” You shrug. “Breaking rules is fun sometimes.”

He looks at you curiously, a thoughtful look on his face. “What about Michael?” he asks. “What did you tell him?”

“The truth; or part of it. That he’s no longer what I want. That I met someone else. That I’m sorry. That I didn’t mean to lie to him but that I’m not willing to go on like that. And that I hope that he’ll find someone who will blow his mind as much as this someone does with mine.” You didn’t tell Michael about the real reason for being with him in the first place. You figure, it would only hurt him and you think you’ve hurt him enough already. Besides, it wouldn’t serve any purpose aside from clearing your own conscience and make  _you_  feel good.

Justin fixes you with a serious stare, again searching for something in your face, your eyes. “You know,” he says again, “this is not the part where the ‘And they lived happily ever after’ comes.”

“It’s not?” you joke and add in exaggerated disappointment, “Balls!”

“We’re only at the beginning,” he says. He’s serious, ignoring your attempt at a joke. Alright, you resign. It’s not that you don’t know that there are millions of things to discuss; it’s just that having him this close again makes your head spin. Your hands on his thighs feel heavy and anchored. His weight on your legs is a welcome reminder that this is, in fact, all very real. You’ve never wanted less to escape reality, even if present reality included ‘the talk’. “I’m not saying you’ll have to change,” he explains, “but something’s gotta give. I won’t let you manipulate me. I won’t let you make decisions for me.”

“I count on that,” you say because you do. You  _are_  going to take him up on that. He seems to believe you, because the next moment his lips seal themselves to yours with intense hunger that matches your own. His little sigh into your mouth, his fingernails digging into your shoulders, the tips of his bangs tickling your cheek, the exhale of his moist warm breath grazing your ear – you’re on sensory overload within seconds, air sizzling, world spinning, colors swirling; each little thing threatening to pull you under. But you don’t care for that as long as you don’t have to let go.

Before you left, Lindsay asked you if you weren’t scared to give up your life to start a new one. You surprised you both when you said that you didn’t feel like you were giving up anything. It seems ridiculous, but at age thirty-seven you feel like you haven’t yet started to live, though bit by bit things start to fall into place, laying the curvy path out ahead of you. Your life is about to spin out of control and instead of being afraid you can’t wait for it to begin. You have an inkling that it’s gonna be a wild ride. Grabbing two handfuls of Justin’s hips you hold on tight, ready for takeoff.

 

 

**The End.**

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, as promised, the song I shamelessly stole the idea and even some of the words from is Попутчица [engl. ‘fellow traveller’] by Вячеслав Малежик (Vyacheslav Malezhik).
> 
> [The following are all official links from the artist himself, so I don’t have a guilty conscience sharing them with you.]  
> [Download link](http://narod.yandex.ru/100.xhtml?slavamalezhik.narod.ru/songs/tuman_1993/11_poputchica.mp3) (right-click on the mp3 url and ‘save target as’)  
> [Listen online](http://slavamalezhik.narod.ru/songs/tuman_1993/11_poputchica.mp3) (should start automatically, if not, click on the mp3 url, then it will)  
> [Link to lyrics](http://malezhik.ru/?go=albums/song/text&p=8&album=26&a=98) (in Russian)
> 
> The song tells roughly the first part of my story: A man and a woman meet on a train and though they basically live in different worlds and are pretty much opposites, they are sort of perfect for one another. What they’re not telling each other is that they’re both married. It‘s a bittersweet, melancholic song, and it ends with them both parting ways (and probably never seeing each other again). That’s the point where my story veers off from the song.
> 
> I used to listen to this song when I was about 10 years old and a few years back I caught it again on the radio. Since then, I’ve had this story stuck inside my head, waiting for the right characters to fill it. And then Brian and Justin came along and made it their own. I hope you enjoyed it and thank you for reading.
> 
>   
> ***


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